Jessica Locklear is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of History at Emory University and an enrolled member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina. Jessica's research focuses on migrations carried out by members and ancestors of the present-day Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina throughout the twentieth century. Jessica's dissertation project demonstrates that Lumbee people have intergenerational histories of utilizing mobility to adapt to ever-changing historical circumstances while maintaining distinct Indigenous identities. Locklear's research is supported by a 2023 Mellon/ACLS Dissertation Innovation Fellowship for which she facilitated community archiving and knowledge sharing to preserve and make the history of Lumbee migrations and American Indian mobility legible to a larger public audience. Jessica holds a bachelor's degree in history and American Indian Studies from the University of North Carolina at Pembroke and a master's degree in history with a public history concentration from Temple University.
Project: “Negotiating Identity Away From Home: Lumbee Mobility, Racial Hierarchies, and the Shaping of Modern American Indian Identity, 1880-1980”